Before, when you beat the game at Heretic, you were allowed to rez and still play your old save. With the latest version, I was just met with my stats screen. WTF?

#1: Why is that ok?
The new change is worse because it literally killed a choice. You don't have the ability to go back and explore the universe you just left.

#2: The change casualizes the game even further
Along with the "newb friendly UI" which lengthens the number of keystrokes and complicates trivial things like docking/installing and changing armors with the HORRIBLY GRATING "anti casual alarm sound" whenever some red blip shows up on your LRS, this change is horrifically along the lines of removing player choice in order to streamline the game. The only reason not letting people reset their saves at Heretic would be preserving people's stats, but it doesn't matter when stats are already posted to the multiverse and people can copy their stats at the endgame screen.

#3: This change is a gross direction for the game for a few reasons:
I don't know what kind of dumbass said it was ok to fix was wasn't broken, but ok. I don't recall anybody who was specifically asking to be locked out of their own save after completing Heretic in my years on the forums/IRC/Discord.

This is the kind of streamlining that George has been leaning towards the last few years in a misguided attempt to catch casuals. In the last stream, George was talking about wanting to make Transcendence into a game that "doesn't require reading to play". Guess what? Transcendence is NOT, and never will be that game. Not only is 2D space roguelike a game that no "casual" player will ever play, but the core concept of having a casual player as the main playerbase is to monetize a marginally small fraction with predatory microtransactions in order to finance the whole game. Little inefficiencies like waiting/dangling shiny loot/RNG lootboxes are all for the weak minded or weak willed that do not have the fortitude to say no to an irrational expense or impulse buy. In other words, Transcendence does not even have the way to leverage a casual player because there are no microtransactions, so why bother attracting them?

With this post, I really hope that I get the ability to RELOAD my save after completing the game at Heretic. I always liked going back with an endgame setup to explore more when I didn't want to restart the game and wait another 24 hours at the beginning from Starton Eridani.

Closing Remarks + Why I have to bring this up now:
I also want George to rethink his strategy for developing the game. I don't know what kind of people George is talking to at his conventions, but the fact is that Transcendence is always going to be a hardcore game by its nature. I really don't like the fact that George has neglected the social aspects of community for the entire duration of my stay here, and the fact that he doesn't even know his playerbase (judging from his casual updates over the years) is going to be the slow death for the game. When George first started streaming the game, it was obvious that he never even played his own game. I know that developing time takes away from game time, but the level of incompetence was almost astounding. Hint? Those weekly streams are a reason that mouse aiming is a thing. If he hadn't even touched his own game from a player perspective, we'd still be stuck with keyboard aiming.

The way to make money off of a hardcore game is to grow its hardcore playerbase. Good examples are Dwarf Fortress, OpenTTD and Wesnoth. Each game dev/devteam are always transparent about updates and upcoming stuff. But even looking at recent announcement threads shows you nothing about changes and either links you to ministry or multiverse. PROHINT: You can't search through the ministry or the multiverse because digdug went through the trouble of looking at when side thrusters were added, and had to manually search everything.

TL;DR:
1. Please let us rez and keep playing when we finish at heretic
2. Please grow the community, trying to follow the advice from @#$! gamedevs that are going for the casual market with nongames is not gonna help when your game doesn't have a casual audience

I would put it a little more delicately (unless I couldn't be bothered doing so, but today isn't one of those days it seems). But I broadly agree with RPC's points re: UI and not-streamlining. In terms of endgame saves not so much...I don't think I've ever picked up an old save file to redo heretic except for bugtesting once or twice.

In terms of what the game tries to be...it is ultimately George's call. But I think there's a lot of refinement that can be done without altering the 'feel' of the game, except to improve things (like speed and convenience of menus) that if done well won't even be noticed unless you go back to the old versions. Trying to get a lot of people will be hard: this is an old game. It's easier (but still hard) for devs to get attention with truly new games. It may require some sacrifices for those of us who've been here since the stone age. But there's definitely a balance there which will be important.

I actually like the save-after-win change. If you leave Human Space, you won. Time for a new game. I thought it was weird that I could resurrect after leaving Human Space.

I agree that the telephone ringing, i.e., enemy alert, is loud and irritating. An alert sound is not a bad idea, just not that sound, and it would be nice to disable the sound.

New shop UI varies by the shop's inventory, which is inconsistent. I would love it if shops defaulted to 'All' instead of 'General' if they have consumables or something else if they do not.

Streamlining things like automatically accessing the CSC Europa vault after learning the password instead of typing it in is a good idea. It would be nice to know things like armor above this level is immune to X without the need to consult a wiki or source code.

Just because a game is complex and requires experience to play well doesn't mean that making it easier for new players to get into it and reducing dependence on outside information sources and notes aren't worthy goals. So chill out. Having a tutorial and more helpful UI isn't turning Transcendence into a microtransaction-supported quick fix game.

The hostile alert has been around since 1.5 or earlier, and should actually be less incessant now when the same ships are constantly entering and leaving LRS range. Still, a limit of once per 2 seconds or so might be good.

Usually when I complete a game, I'm done with it. But occasionally it would be nice to be able to continue from the last save. This also applies to EP.

New shop UI varies by the shop's inventory, which is inconsistent. I would love it if shops defaulted to 'All' instead of 'General' if they have consumables or something else if they do not.

You are playing the beta version, right? With the improvements, I love the tabs. But you can set the default tab to a different one by control clicking it to move it to the leftmost position. This should probably be explained in-game or made more intuitive.

@ NMS: I play the most recent version - I must to maintain my mods. I like the tabs, but I do not like that "All" is not the default. I did not know that "Ctrl-click" sets the default... probably because I do not use the mouse at all unless I absolutely must, which is almost never (meaning I would not have thought to try setting default with mouse clicks). If anything, mouse gets in the way unless I have a dockscreen with two or more options sharing the same hotkey.

I have played another game with tabs, and "All" is the default, instead of more specific tabs like commodities, weapons, and other items. I prefer seeing everything by default, then narrow down choices later if necessary; not the other way around.

making it easier for new players to get into it and reducing dependence on outside information sources and notes

I agree, but the changes I pointed out are NOT making it easier for new players. For example, the UI is actually really bad.

The #1 rule of bad UI is actively hiding information by requiring extra steps from the user. With this new UI, you are NOT defaulted to the ALL tab. What if I'm a dumb casual that can't read and wants to look for ammo? Guess what, I have to click on the "ammo" tab or click the right arrow button two times. Because of that extra step(s!), that information is actively excluded from the nonreading casual player and makes the new UI unforgivably bad from the old one.

In fact, there is a simple change to make this UI from complete @#$! into decent:

But you can set the default tab to a different one by control clicking it to move it to the leftmost position.

PM is right in that the tabs should always default to "all" instead of something else. Anything else besides "all" is just the UI actively hiding items from the player.

George is making the classic "casual appeal" design flaw I keep seeing from bad devs. In this case, he thinks he knows more than the player, and makes a choice for them that actively impedes from gameflow in an attempt to casualize game design. In this example, George is making a choice for the player (by grouping items together). But what does that really do? All it really does is hide items from the player. It never added any extra information, but rather, subtracted information. If a player was really looking for ammo, and we were set to the "all" tab, the player would already be motivated and look for the "ammo" tab instinctively, OR just scroll down the list not the other way around. I don't think a player in the "General" tab would even know that tabs existed because there was no internal incentive to look if tabs existed.

Yes, I'm being picky about a minor detail because I hate the reasoning that gamedevs think "I MUST MAKE A CHOICE FOR PLAYERS" because of its inherently derogatory and discriminating attitude towards the playerbase. Whereas George's current UI design choice is discriminatory, my UI design choice is inclusive because not only are casuals able to scroll down, but if somebody was looking for weapons or armor, they would be inclined to read and pick the tab, NOT the other way around (casuals don't say "I want to look at this Devices and Armor tab when I dock into this station" before having even known the tab exists).

it would be nice to be able to continue from the last save

It was always a thing, but that was taken away by George. If I'm done with a save, like Shrike and PM are, I would never touch it again and delete it. This change never positively affected players like Shrike and PM. This change only negatively affected people like me, who actively go back to old saves to test out stuff.

I like the 'saves' that take you to the stats screen, but there should be an option to have the game also generate a save right before you gate out of human space. I also agree that the shops should default to the 'all' tab, and that some sort of tab switching hotkeys(number keys?) should be added.

... casualizes the game even further ... hardcore playerbase. Good examples are Dwarf Fortress, OpenTTD and Wesnoth. ... dumb casual that can't read ...

First of all, check your superiority complex. These ideas that only idiots like quick-fix puzzle games and that "real" gamers should like games that are obtuse, complex, difficult, and appealing to a narrow but passionate audience are really toxic. Maybe that's not what you mean, but that's the sense I'm getting. Anyway, I think it's best to balance complexity, difficulty, accessibility, and fun gameplay. So what Transcendence should aim for is not Bejeweled, obviously, but less Dwarf Fortress and more Diablo 2.

The #1 rule of bad UI is actively hiding information by requiring extra steps from the user.

The information often cannot all be displayed at once (and even if it could, covering the whole screen with information that has to be searched along multiple axes is a different kind of bad design; see the Windows 8 start screen). The question is whether it's better to search a single (often very long) list or select a shorter list before searching it. I have my key repeat delay on minimum and a free-scrolling mouse wheel, and even so I generally find it faster to find what I'm looking for with the tabs. I really like the default tab settings in the current beta, but I do think the method for changing them should be more intuitive and explained to the player.

I don't think a player in the "General" tab would even know that tabs existed ...

Tabs are a really common interface element in games, web browsers, and other software, and they're in a prominent place above the item list, so I'm not especially concerned about players failing to notice they exist. However, giving them a more traditional tab-shaped outline and/or adding yellow arrow key indicators on either side might be reasonable.

My vote is to keep the General tab as the default first tab for the commodities exchanges as that is the one which shows commodities rather than devices / armor. In many space games commodity or trade goods are in a different tab or menu to ship devices / upgrades, so new players would likely expect the current behavior.

I think the two main issues with the current tab system are:

There is no hint / help screen telling the player how to rearrange tabs etc.

The first thing I want to check when I visit shops is to see what weapons and armor I can buy (or see how many they have so I can sell without getting hurt by buying limits). Yes, I tend to be a warmonger in these kind of games. I tend to care more about devices and equipment than commodities (in part because they tend to be the big money makers when selling). The one time I care more about commodities is when I want to stack longzhu spheres and other enhancers to buff an endgame item to 150%. Of course, now that solar items no longer give fuel in 1.8 alphas, I may pay more attention to fuel.

About tabs, I just noticed that if the default tabs get changed, it is written to your settings and becomes permanent. One of the lines has something like "filterAll" after I change the default to "All".

It would be a nice if there was a way to change default tab with the keyboard in the game.

i don't know why people are complaining about the 4 tabs in the shops you have to click on to sort out the contents.
previous versions were way worse, the last version i played, i would go into most shops and click buy and see nothing there and i was like wtf? it took me until 70% of the way through the run before i realized there was a button that says "show equippable items" or so,ething, i forget ..previous versions had no sorting options at all.

the new system has a general tab, the devices tab and an ammo tab. its pretty self explanatory and it seems awfully clear to me when i see it. the tabs are right there in plain sight, not hidden.

i actually think if i was a casual player, i would be really overwhelmed by the sheer number of items in the shop if it defaulted me to the "all" tab and i just see everything in one huge list.

i dunno what the op is talking about with " docking having been made more complicated with more keystrokes and stuff...you fly near the thing you want to dock with and press "d", how is that complicated?! if theres lots of things jumbled togther, you fly near the thing you want to dock with and press "f" until it targets the thing you want and then press "d", how can they make it simpler?
unless they meant the "dock services" in the shops? i mean, once you learn what the dock services is, you enter the shop, hit "d" then hit "r" to refuel, hit "a" to get into your armor to repair it, or hit "i" to install devices. how could they make it simpler or cut down keystrokes?

as for continuing to play after you beat the heretic system...why would you want to? at that point, you should have pretty much cleared everything, there should be nothing left to do.
i know that whenever i finish heretic, the only things i usually leave behind a a few ares shipyards, because those are just tedious and not worth the effort to destroy them.
at the point i finish heretic, i've got over a million federation credits, nothing to spend them on, 6 figures of ringer money(rin) and nothing to spend it on. i'll have top tier weapons and armor, with nothing better to upgrade to. there's nothing left to do so why would i want to keep tooling around in a "cleared" game file?

almost every roguelike that exists, gives you a "game over" if you actually manage to beat it and "ascend".

logically speaking, if your ship just enetered the galactic core on a one way trip, how would it then turn around and come back?

i'm not trying to be a jerk, i'm just wondering why this is such an awful thing.

In the beginning, there were no sorting options, and 'All' was it. Sorting options would be nice when lists were huge.

Then, there was 'S'how and 'H'ide dock service items, where 'H'ide was the default. It was annoying, and I put 'S'how on default. The minor action was as much in plain sight as tabs.

Then, tabs we have today. Unlike minor action, there is no hint that tab order can be changed, and player either needs the mouse to change the default in-game or edit settings out of game. If player uses arrow keys, he changes tabs only for that visit, and next visit he does it all over again (unless he knows default could be changed).

For me, the first thing I generally want to look for are weapons and other devices because they are usually the most valuable items to loot and I like equipment upgrades that make my ship more powerful. Consumables are rarely big ticket items, yet they are shown by default until player does something to change that (which is currently not obvious).

Ever since the sorts were implemented, I had to press a button to restore the original 'All' behavior. With current tabs, I had no idea that tab default could be changed (because I do not use mouse while playing) and I usually do not view the settings files.

I think this is what the OP meant by more keystrokes. He docks, enters a shop, then he needs to use arrow keys to cycle through tabs to see the items he wants - for every visit. He probably did not know that the default tab could be changed. (I did not until I read this topic.)

If I was a casual player, I would be like "Where's the stuff?!" when I do not see the items I expect to see.

Scroll bar would be nice to give the player an idea how big the list is when it is pages long.

I would like the resurrrect option back as well. It was really handy to be able to try different things in the late game after you had "won".

An example is the Teraton fabricator. I normally avoid these because they always eat me. Being able to return to one and play around after the end of the game is a great help in working out how to use them and not die in the process. (And to be honest, without the info in the forum/wiki I still probably wouldn't know how to use them.)

Otherwise it's a long trip from Eridani to be able to do this.

Maybe have it enabled in debug mode?
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Also NMS's idea about adding yellow arrow key indicators on either side of the tabs is great. Worth a Ministry ticket IMO.